Book Review: Bridge of Deaths by M. C. V. Egan

Book: Bridge of Deaths

Author:  M. C. V. Egan

Pages:   374

Format:  Kindle/ebook

Publisher:  Author House (June 2011)

Book Source:   Provided by Author

Category:   Historical Fiction

Style:   Character-driven

The date: August 15, 1939. The place:   Storstrombroen in Denmark. The people: a pilot, a copilot, two oil-company executives, a German corporate lawyer and a British member of Parliament.  A fiery crash, suspicious circumstances, conflicting reports, five deaths, and one survivor.  A world on the brink of war.  All true facts, all meticulously documented.

Add in Zionists, Palestinians, an arms race, the military industrial complex on three continents, psychics, nightmares, hypnotists, past life regression, a Peruvian shaman and espionage.  Garnish with a famous bridge and landmark notorious for Nazis gun placements, a watery grave for scores of Allied aircraft and a popular suicide destination.  Stir well and you have a really great action/suspense thriller.  All the elements are there.

Tom Clancy would have spun a tale of spy vs. spy, arms dealers, intercontinental assassins and Nazi infiltrators.  John Grisham could have produced a novel rife with Big Oil, political intrigue, corporate posturing, dirty dealings, and sabotage.  Dan Brown would have lead the reader down a maze of cold, hard facts and totalitarianism vs. deep conviction and heroic sacrifice, all against a backdrop of spiritual intensity and intricate relationships with consequences on a global scale spanning more than seven decades.

Cut-away of the
Lockhead Electra

Unfortunately, Ms. Egan doesn't do any of these things.  Lost and floundering in a sea of conflicting loyalties (conventional scholarly research vs. journeys of faith), she cannot decide which approach to take, dabbles with each and ultimately accomplishes none.

In an attempt to better understand her grandfather and explain the reasons for his death, she poured her heart and soul into this book.  She sacrificed decades of her life and a significant amount of money to the effort.  She retraced her grandfather's footsteps and researched as carefully as any historian working on their doctorate dissertation.  However, her personal journey into the spiritual or supernatural arena left her doubting her own veracity (or at least growing fretful of what "true" historians would make of her work) and decided to make her research into fiction.

Book Review: The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

Book:  The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

Author:  Mary Ann Shaffer, Annie Barrows

Pages:  290

Format: Hardcover, Paperback, Audiobook, Kindle/ebook

Publisher:  Dial Press (July 2008)
Book Source:  Private Loan

Category:  Historical Fiction

Style:  Character-driven, written as letters between characters

Synopsis from GoodReads:

“ I wonder how the book got to Guernsey? Perhaps there is some sort of secret homing instinct in books that brings them to their perfect readers.” January 1946: London is emerging from the shadow of the Second World War, and writer Juliet Ashton is looking for her next book subject. Who could imagine that she would find it in a letter from a man she’s never met, a native of the island of Guernsey, who has come across her name written inside a book by Charles Lamb….

As Juliet and her new correspondent exchange letters, Juliet is drawn into the world of this man and his friends—and what a wonderfully eccentric world it is. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society—born as a spur-of-the-moment alibi when its members were discovered breaking curfew by the Germans occupying their island—boasts a charming, funny, deeply human cast of characters, from pig farmers to phrenologists, literature lovers all.

My Take:

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society came through my front door, another one of my friend Ginger's recommendations.  Truth to tell, my #1 daughter-in-law, Ariane, recommended it to me first by a couple of months, but she failed to actually put the book into my hands and so it slipped by me.  When she reminded me—she was there when Ginger dropped by—I remembered, as I recalled her repeated admonition:  "Yeah.  The author got the manuscript finished, but she never published it.  Then she died, and her niece came along and got it published.  But you have to publish your book because I'm not a writer and can't do that!"